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[cramnewton-blog]

- 11/29

I'll use this opportunity to rant about where my head has been for a few weeks. It looks like this semester, one of my most difficult I'll add, will be my last semester being a full time student. Not by choice but simply because the classes aren't available. I planned on taking 5 classes but 3 of them are at concurrent times. It doesn't make sense to me that all of the technical classes are on the same days, let alone the same time, but that's not up to me. As the rest of the classes I need to graduate are tech classes I'll probably be running into this problem for the remainder of my enrollment especially since some courses are only offered during a specific semester (Spring/Fall only). With only 36 credits left it's disheartening to do the math and find out that could take up to 6 semesters to complete. And it seems like all those options they talk about in those orientation seminars don't apply to me. I'm not allowed to cross-register and take the classes at UB. They aren't offered online, during J-Term, or summer sessions. I would also have to take out way more loans than expected to continue to pay for housing. Im seriously considering transferring at this point. City College of New York (CCNY) is a school with a strong engineering program back at home. I called the other day to ask about transferring. They told me about the process and requirements but would not talk about credit equivalency. Long story short they won't tell me if they'll take my credits until after I apply and have been accepted. As if applications don't cost money. If they decide not to take a good chunk of my credits it could still take me forever to finish and end up being costly. Somehow, in the midst of all this, the idea of changing my major crept into my mind. Not for the first time either. I've never been particularly passionate about school but lately I've felt especially indifferent. It's one thing for me to be bored in Anthropology but I want to feel more connected to my major. For that reason I'm thinking of jumping ship to electrical engineering. Originally I took up mechanical because I liked to work with tools but the further I get into my major the less I want to do this for the rest of my life. I'd rather work on electronics than engines any day. But guess what changing my major would be? Time consuming and expensive. At this point I'm in between three options: Stay in buffalo, slowly finish my major, and find cheaper living arrangements; Apply for CCNY and likely have to retake a few courses; or i could change my major at either school. It seems I'll be spending a lot of time and money on school regardless though.

[cramnewton-blog]

ten

In project 2 I argued that American prisons and American slavery had too much in common. A key component of that argument was that slaves and inmates were exploited for relatively free labor. Slave owners felt as if they were indeed paying their slaves since they provided food and shelter. Prison law makers seem to feel a similar way. That’s why for project 3 I will be developing an argument as to why inmates should be paid higher wages.

The first thing I think I should do is find out what the wages are at various prisons in the state of New York. This may be listed on the Department of corrections website. if not I will see if anyone else has studied this recently enough to be useful. If neither of these pan out I know that the national averages are reported in the census, most recently in 2010.

The next thing I want to look in to are the day to day costs of an inmate. I want to find out what items sold in the commissary cost and see what a week of work can buy you. I wonder if you would be able to consistently cover your expenses. Especially when unexpected fees occur. For instance, some prisons in some counties charge inmates 3 dollars for seeing a doctor and 2 dollars for a prescription with the maximum amount any inmate can make being under 5 dollars a week. That means if you worked all week, got sick, and needed a doctor with only your income to support you then you might be out of luck.

Lastly I’d like to collect data on what sells in high and low volumes at the commissaries. This will, hopefully, give me some insight as to how someone whom is convicted budgets and prioritizes. I fear though that this will be more difficult to find. It may not be just a phone call away, I might not find it online and I’m fairly certain there aren’t any peer reviewed articles on the subject. Surveying our classes would also be ineffective. My next resort, if approved by our instructor, would be to ask people who were once incarcerated. Although I may know a few people who would respond to my question would that be a large enough sample size? One way to reach more people would be to find some kind of message board or blog for formerly incarcerated people and pose the question there.

[cramnewton-blog]

Keep it 100

Have you ever struggled in a class or even just a particular subject, exponents for example? Usually I hate to generalize but I believe we’ve all had that “not getting it” moment. Was there a reason for it? Bad teacher? Just not a math wiz? Some other combination of reasons? School is broken. That's an understatement but Sal Khan, creator of Khan academy explains it more eloquently in a TED talk. (I’ll post the link at the end, its worth the watch). The problem with school, according to Khan, is that we do not teach for mastery. When I was younger I took swimming classes; I should add I was pretty good. At the Y we were grouped into different classes based on skill level. When you learned all the skills required for that level you moved up to a different class. This is similar to rank in martial arts where you have to do all the white belt stuff before you can get a yellow belt. The big idea here is that you have to master all of the skills before you move on to learning something else. Traditional schooling however groups students together by age rather than skill level. They then teach these students at the same pace and allow them to move on before a subject is mastered. For instance, we take 2-3 weeks to teach a class exponents then we give a test. If I score a 75% on that test that leaves 25% worth of material I haven't grasped (obviously) Typically though, we don’t revisit this topic. We move on to adding and subtracting exponentially, and I might score a 70% on that test. Pretty soon the problem gets worse. I take an algebra class and I’m completely lost. If you don’t build ¼ of a level of a house you can’t move on. It has to be completed. The same should apply to intellectual foundations. We have become so focused on testing and less on what students actually know. The idea that a 65% (or anything short of 100%) is sufficient for promotion holds students back from reaching their potential. If they were allowed to learn at their own pace and fully master basic and intermediate topics they would be more able to grasp more advanced topics down the road. Everyone has the capacity to do well. There is no math gene or math people, just someone with a better handle on a skill. Let's teach for mastery -- not test scores https://www.ted.com/talks/sal_khan_let_s_teach_for_mastery_not_test_scores

[cramnewton-blog]

            In a competitive world economy, we need an educated workforce. Therefore, it is counter-productive to price our citizens out of an education. When choosing a candidate in this election pay close attention to their attitude about investing in education.

           Tuition costs rise every year and public education can cost roughly $9,000 yearly. These costs increase if a student has to take out loans, as 42% do, and also repay interest rates. College is often looked at as an investment. You pay for your degree in exchange for more job availability and a higher salary. This is not always the case unfortunately.

           Even though the recession officially ended in 2009 it has still had a lasting impact on the nations employment, specifically young people. Unemployment for high school graduates is over 19% and over 7% for those with a bachelor’s degree or higher. In addition to unemployment, underemployment also plagues the workforce under the age of 25. Nearly half of working college graduates work jobs that do not require a degree. Nearly 35% of them work jobs which do not require high school diplomas. These statistics coupled with the fact that the average amount of debt for a college graduate is upwards of $25,000 creates a brief outlook for prosperity among students. Some people may even feel as though the degree might not be worth the money.

           How does your candidate plan to tackle this issue? Donald Trump says that college can never actually be free, the bill would just be shifted to someone else. This is true, it won’t suddenly be any cheaper to run a university. The difference would be where the money comes from: taxpayers. Hilary Clinton has made it very clear she intends to build the middle class by taxing the wealthy more heavily. The increase in these taxes would be used to neutralize the cost of tuition for families with an income of $85,000 immediately with provisions for families with incomes between $85,000 and $125,000 annually.

           Donald Trump has a different approach. He believes that government money is too scarce to be spread to fund free tuition. He also doesn’t seem to think that burden should fall on the wealthy. He has actually proposed lower taxes for the upper class saying it would lead to job growth. This agenda, to me, seems self-beneficial. Trump has already been ousted for evading taxes for years and he’s still looking for tax breaks. He claims to be invested in the work force but doesn’t want tax dollars to be used toward the education of the same workforce.

           Aside from being cheaper I think more government control over universities will also result in better schools. Institutions would have more pressure on them to raise their graduation rates and make sure that that money is not wasted. With this added pressure we may see more required office hours for instructors, better tutoring programs, and stronger admission requirements. In essence, by shifting the bill of education we can improve quality and lower costs, and national debt.

[geraldb11-blog1]

Finally Leaving The House

           Getting ready to leave for college was one of the most stressful times of my life. I had so many different thoughts and expectations rushing through my mind and I really didn’t know how to handle it. I was about to move over 800 miles away from home to somewhere I had almost no relatives or friends. I knew I would be completely out of my comfort zone. The fact that I waited until the last minute do everything didn’t help either. I learned to plan well ahead of time when I cant just run back home to grab the things I need.

           It was in January of 2013. New years had just past, and I realized that I hadn’t bought anything that I needed to live comfortably in a dorm for the next five months. Of course I waited until the last minute to go shopping because I love adding extra stress to my life by procrastinating. I went to the mall literally the night before I was supposed to get on a plane to fly to Alabama. This was one of many bad decisions I made about this whole experience. My mom and I scrambled to find all the dorm room necessities and other things that I needed to be prepared for the semester.

           I hadn’t even begun to pack my clothes that I would need for the time that I would be staying down south. The only things I had packed were my 20 pairs of sneakers because what’s more important than having enough sneakers to wear? So I stayed up all night folding and packing clothes.

           My flight was scheduled to leave at 5am and I felt like I was pretty prepared to leave. Before I went to sleep I set an alarm for 4am because I live about five minutes driving from the airport. So I went to bed glad that I had finally had all my things together and was ready to finally be on my own for a little while.

           I didn’t fall asleep until about 2am. When I woke it wasn’t from my alarm I just woke up on my own. It was still dark out so I didn’t think that it was morning yet. I was wrong. It was almost 4:30am and I started rushing to put all my things in in the car. My mom drove me to the airport and I just barely mad it on time.

           I have an uncle that live about an hour away form where I was going to school so he met me at the airport and gave me a ride. When I got to school and started unpacking I realized that I had left all the stuff I had bought for my dorm at home in buffalo. I only had enough money to make the first payment of my tuition so I didn’t know what to do. I had no sheets, comforter, pillows, towels, or washcloths. I pretty much only had clothes and sneakers. Luckily my uncle stayed to help me get settled in. when he seen I didn’t have any thing he took me to walmart to get what I needed. He even bought me some snacks to hold me over on those late hungry nights.

           This was really a horrible start to being off on my own for the first time. I was so irresponsible. I learned a lot from it though. Since this happened I have been to two other schools and I haven’t faced the same problem again. So even though it was stressful and one of the most annoying things to happen to me, I’m glad it happened because it taught me some responsibility and let me know how I needed to always be prepared.  

[cramnewton-blog]

This is so relatable, at least for me. I can't do anything until the last minute and I can't travel without a suitcase full of sneakers. It's a good thing your uncle helped you out but I'm curious, what would you have done if he couldn't? Secondly, how exactly have you changed your preparation process since this incident? I could use the tips. My favorite thing about this post was the tone you used. It added some personality to the text. This isn't a particularly uncommon story but it was interesting because you're voice made it unique.

[gabbinwithgabbie-blog]

Why I like being single/married

I’m sure that this title makes no sense to anyone reading it. I’ll explain the context behind it soon. Honestly, I am not someone who is attached to anyone in particular, this is probably also why I am not someone who has an addictive personality. I just like to have a good time with people and I am not really too concerned with future plans or labels or anything that might get in the way of me enjoying what is right in front of me. I’m a very in-the-moment kind of person. Or, I like to pretend that I am, and hopefully that is enough to make me that way.

I am a public communications major, so I have a few classes that I need to take that are major-specific. One of them is called intro to oral communication. I am absolutely obsessed with my teacher, he is engaging and I really feel like he makes everyone perform well because of the way that he teaches us the material. One of the things that we had to do in class last week was two impromptu speeches. The way that he set the activity up was almost like an improv game, we walked up to the front of the class and picked up a card, and we had to give a 15 second to three minute speech on whatever the card was about. Some of the prompts on the card would read something like, “how I would get out of a blind date when I find out the guy’s a loser”, or “toast at a wedding”. When my name was called second in line, (thinking to myself ‘DAMN my last name just HAD to be at the front of the alphabet’), my heart was pounding with anticipation.  

I take a breath, and walk to the front of the class with confidence. I pick a card, and read it with internal dread. ‘Why I like being single/married’. I laugh out loud. “Well, I’m not married, so I guess that rules out one of the options, and I’m not sing… oh… never mind.” I’m trying to suppress the panic and embarrassment that is beginning to bubble up from the bottom of my stomach. I was really not trying to explain to my class the mess that was my love life, especially because my boyfriend had just dumped me and then asked me to marry him in the same week. I knew I had to start talking soon, so I began crafting what I would believe someone would say had they been completely happy with being single. “I love the fact that I can go a week without shaving my legs and I don’t have to worry about being judged about it. I love that I can go out to a party and not have anyone texting me the whole time, and knowing that a fight would come later because I went out to have fun. I like that my money is all for me and I don’t need to worry about paying for things I don’t need, or paying for other people. Being single is being free, so I guess thats why I like it”. I sat down, and was distracted with my thoughts for the rest of class.

The same way I try to convince myself that I am not interested in labels and that I don’t dwell on what’s to come, I tried to believe that I really did enjoy being single. I know that there are a bunch of good reasons to be happy, but honestly I couldn’t help but imagine how my story would have gone had I answered the prompt with the other option. I definitely am NOT ready for marriage at this point in my life, but sometimes it’s hard to be alone, especially after a two year relationship. I never thought my communications class would make me feel so existential. I guess right now I just have to keep on coming up with more reasons why I like being single, and eventually it’ll be real. I’m not lonely in any sense of the word, and I think absence of something that was once there would make anyone uncomfortable. I believe that things happen for a reason though, and I don’t find that it was a coincidence that I received that prompt out of all 150 on the table. I think that I was meant to think about how to make myself happier while i’m by myself and while I’m here at college, and I think that with time, I’ll be able to do it without thinking. Like my old baseball coach used to say to me when I missed a ball and felt bad about it, 'practice makes perfect’.

[cramnewton-blog]

Does it ever feel like you're faking it? I don't mean that condescendingly, but honestly. I've been where you are, kind of. My girlfriend and I go to different schools and soon after we hit two years I started having thoughts of “freedom” too. I dumped her. I don’t think I cracked because of the distance. I just let the idea of being single on campus get to me. It was working out well for my roommate. It's not my life though. It only took a few days to realize I wanted her back. I like the stability, the idea of someone texting me all the time. Annoying? Quite, but it's cute. She means well. Its none of my business why you guys broke up, but I understand the quick realization he wanted you back . Don’t shut him out and force yourself to like being single. Don't jump into a marriage you don't want. Don't not live in the moment. Use your moments to figure out what you actually like. I hope this makes sense.

[elitelambd-blog]

My Future

Ever since I was a little kid my dream is to play in the NFL. I remember one Sunday morning watching a Giants game with cousins and uncle; what a good day. I sat on the couch just looking at talented people play an incredible sport. In the game there were tensions building up, emotions pouring out, excitement from winning, and aggravation from losing. What excited me the most was when Justin Tuck made a huge hit on Tom Brady. He made him lose his breathe and fumble the ball for a touchdown. The Giants won the game. I was so amazed at how the game was played. From that point on I knew that I wanted to play football.

After the game was over I asked my uncle if he could teach me how to play football. He took out the football, brought me downstairs and said “catch.” We practiced every weekend in the park for at least two hours. We did this for at least four years straight. The reason he made me practice every weekend was because I had difficulties in learning how to hit the right way and also run without fumbling the ball. I used to run the ball, get hit, and fumble quickly. So my uncle made me do drills. Some days we would do running, catching, cuts, and other drills. In the beginning I was rusty, but over time I progressed. I progressed in my running, hitting, and catching drills. My uncle made me keep practicing even if I was tired because he has always believed you should not give up on yourself. We ran drills over and over again until I got it right. I felt so tired and exhausted, but at the end it paid off. It paid off because I got better than I was. I was putting the effort each day so I could improve on what I needed to improve on. Every day was hard work and dedication for the sport I truly fell in love with it. I worked hard every day to make sure my movements improved. While in high school I put my all into practice and during games. The drills that my uncle taught me I brought it to my high school, then college ball. During college I started all the games I played because of the hard work I put in and out the field.

�

[cramnewton-blog]

Firstly, great topic. I think it's cool that you can pinpoint the exact moment you got inspired. I played football in high school too but I had never played before then. I didn't have uncles or any other former players around to guide me through it but I played a lot in the street with other kids. It's a lot different with pads right? But just like you I just practiced harder until I got the hang of it. I used to come to practice early or stay late to get used to turning my head and catching the ball with equipment on. One suggestion I have is that you share some of your uncles secrets with us? What kinda drills were you running that got you better?

[cramnewton-blog]

“.. at least for me.”

[cramnewton-blog]

Why Didn't They Fire Me?

“Hello, this is Tatiana from Premier Studios.” I couldn’t believe I’d missed this call. I pulled the phone harder against my ear while the rest of the voicemail played. She thanked me for applying and asked me if I could come in this week to shadow another intern. I thought it was almost funny that I’d gotten the position. I thought hundreds of other teenagers would be volunteering themselves to at a place like this. On the day of my interview I couldn't help but notice the hallway full of gold records and their website boasted about the top tier artists they’ve serviced. I was about to get the chance to contribute to that success. The manager on my first day was Megan, the same woman that had interviewed me. She looked young. Not so much in the face but in her appearance. She had deep red hair, a lip piercing and a darkly colored tattoo on her right thigh. She always wore skirts but I could never make out what it was supposed to be. I definitely didn't feel comfortable asking. Aside from being generally attractive Megan wasn't very pleasant. When I submitted my resume I thought I was a long shot to be hired; after our interview I was sure I would never here from Premier again. She seemed dissatisfied with my lack of musical background. But here I was, starting my first day and neither one of us were quite sure how I slid though the cracks and got hired. “Tatiana wants you to help us pass our fire inspection this week. You'll be working with Wayne moving equipment out of Studio F.” And that's what we did for most of the day. I was definitely over dressed for this. I wore a button up shirt and tan khakis meanwhile Wayne wore a navy t-shirt and matching sweatpants. We made small talk periodically. I talked about high school and he talked about interning. He had been there for 5 years and had also started after he finished high school. I didn't really see how he could be working for free for the last five years but I didn't question him. “You ever meet anyone worth talking about?” I asked him after a few minutes of silence between questions. “Yea plenty.” He replied without looking up at me. He continued “You listen to rap right? J. Cole just finished his album a few weeks ago. He did something like 160 six hour sessions so he was around a lot.” “I missed J. Cole!?” I felt my voice crack but I was too upset to be embarrassed. “You sure he finished it?” “Yea but don't be too torn up. Rappers love it here. Most of the stuff in this room is actually Busta Rhymes. He has time booked everyday but only comes every so often.” I wanted to ask Wayne who else had time booked regularly, who he’d met and actually gotten to talk to. But I wouldn't get the chance. I stepped on a wire and a speaker fell off a shelf behind me and crashed to the ground. I heard Wayne curse under his breathe. I looked at the mess I’d made then I looked at him, hoping for some kind of reassurance. But Wayne didn't look at me. He was looking at the door. I cursed too. He was looking at Megan. She was frozen in the doorway. Her arms were raised as if she was juggling horror and fury. “Go on break.” She practically mumbled. “Wow, I didn’t get fired” I thought with an invisible smirk. Then the word crept into my mind. “Yet” It hadn't occurred to me that anyone besides the 3 of us had heard the crash but as I passed Megan on my way out the situation easily got twice as bad. Behind her was an enormous man in a black suit carrying two boxes of Domino’s pizza. He was definitely security for someone. Before I put the pieces together I saw him coming down the hallway. Busta Rhymes. Of course he’s in today! I didn't know where I would take my break or how long to take. I only knew I was taking the stairs.